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    <a href="../index.html">cppreference.com</a> &gt; <a href=
    "index.html">C++ Algorithms</a> &gt; <a href=
    "max_element.html">max_element</a>
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  <div class="name-format">
    max_element
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  <div class="syntax-name-format">
    Syntax:
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  <pre class="syntax-box">
  #include &lt;algorithm&gt;
  iterator max_element( iterator start, iterator end );
  iterator max_element( iterator start, iterator end, BinPred p );
</pre>

  <p>The max_element() function returns an iterator to the largest
  element in the range [<em>start</em>,<em>end</em>).</p>

  <p>If the binary predicate <em>p</em> is given, then it will be used
  instead of the &lt; operator to determine the largest element.</p>

  <div class="related-examples-format">
    Example code:
  </div>

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    <p>For example, the following code uses the max_element() function
    to determine the largest integer in an array and the largest
    character in a vector of characters:</p>
    <pre class="example-code">
 int array[] = { 3, 1, 4, 1, 5, 9 };
 unsigned int array_size = 6;
 cout &lt;&lt; &quot;Max element in array is &quot; &lt;&lt; *max_element( array, array+array_size) &lt;&lt; endl;              

 vector&lt;char&gt; v;
 v.push_back(&#39;a&#39;); v.push_back(&#39;b&#39;); v.push_back(&#39;c&#39;); v.push_back(&#39;d&#39;);
 cout &lt;&lt; &quot;Max element in the vector v is &quot; &lt;&lt; *max_element( v.begin(), v.end() ) &lt;&lt; endl;           
</pre>

    <p>When run, the above code displays this output:</p>
    <pre class="example-code">
 Max element in array is 9
 Max element in the vector v is d               
</pre>
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    <a href="max.html">max</a><br>
    <a href="min.html">min</a><br>
    <a href="min_element.html">min_element</a>
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